What You Need to Know About Becoming a Private CA

Smart Options for Speed, Efficiency, Savings

When securing external public-facing webpages, buying your SSL certificates from globally trusted Certificate Authorities (CAs) is absolutely the way to go. But, there are plenty of situations where you need private SSL certificates for internal apps, servers and more. The CA/Browser Forum no longer allows publicly trusted SSL certificates to include local names such as internal server names and reserved IP addresses. And, it's no longer possible to purchase a validated SSL certificate for mail and wiki domain names for internal use. But, becoming a Private CA isn't your only option for purchasing and managing private SSL certificates.

Common Private SSL Certificate Scenarios

Private SSL certificates make perfect sense for services that aren't available to the public and when you need to restrict access to a select group of users. Typical situations include:

Virtual Private
Networks (VPNs)

Data and/or file replication between servers

Remote backup

Access to mail &
personal accounts

Remote administration

File-sharing applications

Cloud services applications

Other closed-user group services

Internal PKIs Are Essential, But Far from Easy

Publicly trusted CA-hosted PKI solutions offer many of the same benefits as an internal or enterprise-branded CA, without all the challenges.

Cost

Skills

Bandwidth

Integration

Complexity

Risk

69% of enterprises don't have clear ownership of the PKI function and lack the resources and skills to support it

Source: Ponemon Study

The Missing Links in Microsoft Certificate Authority (CA)

Microsoft Windows is a primary access point to your company assets within the firewall, over your VPN and from the browser to cloud services. But, you need to control access to ensure only authorized employees and devices gain access. Passwords are expensive to manage, difficult to use and can be stolen by malware. PKI delivers a strong digital identity. While Microsoft CA is free and might seem easy to use, it has significant limitations:

Lacks visibility and management of all certificates, whether for Microsoft clients or a non-Microsoft app inside or outside the firewall

Doesn't automatically manage non-Microsoft clients

Upkeep is expensive

It's hard to find and maintain internal skillsets to support it

Automated certificate issuance, installation and renewal to non-Microsoft clients is required to prevent a failure to authenticate that could lead to customers, partners or employees unable to do their job

Managed PKI Makes Good Business Sense

Publicly trusted CA-hosted PKI solutions offer many of the same benefits as an internal or enterprise-branded CA, without all the challenges.

Enterprise Alternatives to Becoming a Private CA

DigiCert Cloud PKI Service

Maintain ControlLimit trust to intermediates issued for your use only and gain complete control over issuance and revocation of end-entity certificates.

Personalize with BrandingBrand your intermediate so everyone can see who issued the certificate, ensuring security and maximizing trust.

Enjoy Worry-Free InfrastructureKeeping up with industry standards and changes, managing the root and maintaining a secure infrastructure are done for you.

Get Flexible OptionsCreate customized certificate profiles or templates that comply to industry standards while giving you control over your organization's chain of trust.

Manage with EaseSimplify the entire lifecycle of both private and public digital certificates without the complexity or huge investment. Order, issue, remediate and renew SSL certificates from a single cloud-based dashboard.

The SSL Store Advantage

Global Resources to Empower Your Team As your CA-neutral advocate, our 75+ experts go beyond best pricing to help you streamline, organize and simplify everything SSL. All from our St. Petersburg, FL, South Africa, Netherlands and India offices.

Real-time Support for Around-the-Clock Answers Your assigned Account Manager has your back—from onboarding to integration. And, you can always get expert answers on demand through our platinum-level support via phone, email and live chat.

Simple Integration with Plugins You already have preferred ways of doing business. That's why we're seamlessly integrated with the APIs of all your go-to CAs and apps to make everything SSL work smoothly.

SSL Installation Service

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